Papademetriou, in publishing a new grave-inscription from Zographo (see Plate), has propounded a theory which, if true, has important consequences for our understanding of Attic comedy in general and of the Lysistrata of Aristophanes in particular. For convenience I reprint the text with two slight modifications.

In line 4 the stone has MYPPINEHKΛHθH. I prefer to assume that the stone-cutter, uncertain of the correct use of eta (cf. πρώΤɛ and Nίκɛς in line 5), has transposed the letters, rather than assume with Papademetriou an unnecessary and unparalleled lengthened form and an omitted augment. After EΤύμως the three dots of punctuation are clear. Even if they were not, metre and sense would suggest that EΤύμως went with the previous sentence. EΤύμως has nearly all its later meaning here. Papademetriou has illustrated the cult-significance of the name M∪ρρίνη.

His thesis is this. We know the first priestess of Athena Nike was appointed round about 450, perhaps after the Peace of Kallias. Here is her gravestone, which, from the style of its lettering and the transition to Ionic which it illustrates, ought to be close to 400. Therefore in 411, when the Lysistrata was performed, the Priestess of Athena Nike was called Myrrhine. In the Lysistrata a Myrrhine appears at the Propylaea, perhaps even on the Nike Bastion, and appears to have a bed and other equipment close at hand. We should therefore assume that Aristophanes' Myrrhine is meant as a portrait.